During a recent visit to Beijing, the conversation at a local restaurant on a Saturday night turned briefly, only briefly, to politics. The video artist Wang Gongxin spoke excitedly about China's so-called Jasmine Revolution, which has been much reported in the American press but barely felt in Beijing art circles. Apparently, he noted, 700 people had descended on a McDonald's in the Wangjing neighborhood, in response to a call on Weibo, the Chinese version of Twitter.